Watching movies such as Cast Away or the latest Bond flick, the product placements are obvious enough. Cast Away was a movie length advertisement for FedEx.

Now NBC is ready to take it to the next level, and embed the marketing message as central premises of the show. Currently product placements is supposed to be just that, the use of the product in a movie or TV show.  The visibility of product placement has become less and less subtle, and it’s unclear to me that movies and TV shows aren’t really just marketing products.  After watching the Italian Job, I sure wanted to get a BMW mini.

While I have no problem with the actual use of real products on TV or in the movies, much of me is nostalgic for the days when Alex Keaton drank from a soda can that was neither Coke or Pepsi.  Today, Alex would be drinking from the highest bidder.  As the line between entertainment and advertising becomes furthered blurred, it becomes more difficult to distinguish between what we actually want and what we are told to want.